They hadn’t planned to deal with us. But they’d had a plan all along. The shaman had helped Jessica escape. Diaz had come up with his bullshit about her psychotic break. And he’d known she’d run for her family’s ranch.
If he’d showed up in force, intimidating the humans and with his lawyers waving around a bunch of legal threats, he could’ve gotten rid of his inconvenient human wife, taken hiswerewolf children, and fucked off home looking like the good guy to anyone who didn’t look too closely.
My blood sizzled in my veins, my claws itching at my fingers, and it had absolutely fuck-all to do with the shaman’s magic. Fuckingbastards.
And now they’d had to pivot, thinking they could adapt their plan and pull it off with a werewolf pack instead of Jessica’s human family. The lawyers had submitted the complaint in advance. They wouldn’t have done that on the off-chance that we’d spontaneously start trouble.
Because they knew we would. Their new plan had to be using magic to incite us to violence. When our side started throwing punches and claws to the kidneys in the midst of what they could plausibly claim was a peaceful legal discussion, and Diaz’s pack’s lawyers witnessed it all, not even Angelo’s friendship with Ian would get us out of trouble.
It was too late to pull Matthew aside and explain. Too late to do anything but hope he and the others kept it together long enough for me to counter it. And the shaman’s outreach toward me hadn’t been simple curiosity, but a probe of my defenses. He’d be ready.
I was the best, damn it—I’d eat him for breakfast. But I needed to focus, I needed Matthew to stall them for a few minutes, and reaching that calm center where my magic welled up and waited for my command was incredibly fucking difficult while surrounded by angry alphas. Even my very own angry alphas.
“I’m here for my children and my wife,” Diaz said without preamble. “If they’re not out here in ten seconds, that’s kidnapping. We’re obviously not here to start trouble,” he lied, baring his teeth. Adding fuel to the fire his shaman had already started. “If you do, you’ll be going away for a long time.”
“Your wife would’ve died without our assistance,” Matthew practically snarled. “And it’s not kidnapping if they’re here voluntarily. You need better lawyers. Better everything.”
Fuck, fuck, fuck. Matthew didn’t react like that. He kept his head level when any other alpha would be losing it…when he hadn’t been spelled. There wouldn’t be a few minutes. The sensation of something crawling on me increased, the other shaman’s magic expanding. I let mine flow out to meet it, forcing myself not to flinch at the greasy, gritty sensation of my power rubbing up against his. I went deep, the real world floating away, everything around me turning into a play projected against a screen with tendrils of energy wrapped around it all like the tentacles of a jellyfish. The shaman’s magic had a pinkish, mottled tinge, like bloody pus. And it kept shifting, as if it wasn’t there at all.
Like the magic that had been on the car.
All at once, I knew exactly what to do, because I’d studied those spell bags last night with Nate, the two of us dissecting them both literally and figuratively.
I took a glance upward from where I lurked in the magical underpinnings of mundane reality. Matthew had taken a threatening step forward, Ian at his elbow, and Diaz’s mocking grin grew…
It had to be now. My heart raced, and I took a deep breath, holding it, drawing my power into a central vortex like a whirlpool, ready to shoot out as soon as I released my inward pull.
My opponent’s magic had a unique ability to self-camouflage. The spell bags had demonstrated that. And right now, his projected power flowed like smoke, opaque and tangible one moment and gone the next, reforming somewhere else. Aiming at it would be useless. That was what he wanted me to do, baiting me into it, offering obvious ways to attack thatI knew instinctively would end in an ambush and disaster, or in spending all my strength to no purpose. If I tried to shield Matthew and the others from the effects of whatever foul potion he’d doused Diaz with, or block his magic from enhancing them, I’d fail.
And if I attacked him directly—and my gods, that was tempting, to strike at him directly, stop his heart or raise the temperature of his brain five degrees and boil it in his skull like a pot roast—then he’d be dead, but I’d also be giving Diaz what he wanted: an excuse.
No, I’d use their own bullshit against them, and put all my faith in the rest of the pack’s abilities to, well, kick their asses.
I gathered all my magic into a tight, concentrated, seething orb, and I could see him watching me, gloating, so sure I was about to throw it at him in a wave of aggression…and instead, I released it in a shimmering curtain, malleable and reflective. I sent it out in front of us, sliding between our group and theirs. The shaman’s spells quivered faintly, reacting to his confusion—and then shuddered with his shock and dismay.
He regathered more quickly than I’d expected, pouring himself into his spells and strengthening them, trying to break through mine.
But too late. My magic slid into place a split second before his own wave of power smashed into them. For a suspended instant, it hovered in the middle of everyone gathered there—and then flipped, rushing back the way it’d come with irresistible force.
I opened my eyes, gasping, my knees gone wobbly with the loss of so much of my magic at once, especially after the way I’d drained my reserves last night, and my vision refocused barely in time for me to watch the shaman’s reflected spell hit Diaz and his men.
They staggered as if they’d been hit by a physical wave, froze—and launched into sudden motion, a whirlwind of claws and fangs and growling, flinging themselves at us like they’d gone feral.
Which they had, of course, as they’d planned for our side to do.
Everyone exploded into action at once. Diaz flung himself at Matthew, six-inch razor-sharp claws aimed for his neck, and my chest clenched, my own claws coming out—but with a shake of his head as if he’d thrown off the last of the other shaman’s magic, Matthew moved to fend him off with dizzying speed, getting him on the ground with a few loud snaps of breaking bone. Diaz’s closest goon made a run for Ian, and I almost felt sorry for him as Ian, laughing in a way that nearly frightenedme, casually sent him flying off his feet and through the air with one swipe of his arm. The other two, their desire to live overwhelmed by the amplified power of their shaman’s magic turned on them by mine, went for Calder. Jared didn’t even bother. He simply took a step to the side and watched as Calder bashed their heads together and dropped them like garbage.
The enemy shaman looked around frantically, as if hoping more reinforcements would appear out of thin air, and started to back up—right into Angelo, who collared him with strength that would’ve surprised anyone who didn’t know him.
The lawyers ran for the cars, but instead of trying to drive off, they dived into the back seat of the closest one and stayed there.
It was all over within thirty seconds. The pack councilors had rushed down the steps and past me to join the fray if needed, but Matthew and Ian were barely even breathing hard, and Calder could’ve been standing there to take the air. The guy Ian had thrown across the driveway was still lying there stunned. Calder’s two victims had started to stir and groan, butthey weren’t exactly raring for a continued fight. And Diaz had stopped screaming and started cursing up a storm, writhing in the muddy gravel as his broken limbs started to heal. I knew exactly how not-fun that was, and I couldn’t have been happier to watch him experience it.
Matthew turned his head and met my eyes, and I gave him a quick nod. I was fine. His shoulders relaxed a fraction.
“Well, that was fun!” Angelo said, with a shit-eating grin. Fucking vampires. He hadn’t even done any of the fighting. He let go of the shaman with more force than strictly necessary, which at least counted for something. “Don’t move, or I’ll have to catch you. You won’t enjoy it. Diaz, anything to say for yourself? Since you assured my boss that you were coming here to present a legal case and peacefully see that your rights were respected?”
“Fuck,” Diaz moaned. “Fuck, my leg!”
